�Itapos;s a dystopian world, not our own, covered in factories and poverty. Iapos;m part of a three-man superhero group, except that weapos;re more like spy-vigilantes with a time-and-space machine - none of us have powers. We have a system: infiltrate a factory, take it down from the inside with fists or intrigue, and rescue all the workers in the machine and bring them to the distant past where nothingapos;s gone wrong, yet.
There are factories and Factories, though, and so far weapos;ve only been able to take out the lower-case breed. The Factories are more like countries, huge and twisted , with their own internal rules. Weapos;re finally ready, and weapos;ve chosen the biggest and the slimiest.
My team-mates, one a cheerful redheaded girl in a skater outfit, the other a grave man in a tailcoat, set out before me, leaving me in our space base. They took the short road: all they had to do was get themselves hired, and, when the time is right, follow my instructions.
My road was longer, and I had no idea how long. I had to work my way up the ranks, become a figure in the Escher-like bureaucracy of the place, and an influential one, at that. I had to worm my way into those wormapos;s trust, find their Achilleapos;s heel and then, when the time was right, Iapos;d send back the time machine with my instructions and location. Weapos;d strike, and strike hard. It would work. Itapos;d worked before...albeit on a much smaller scale.
I smoothed my face into a mask, and waited to be molded.
Twenty-five years later, I stalked on stiletto heels into the meeting room/ central courtroom and took my place by the side of the accused. The redheaded girl, her face smudged, winked at me. I turned my eyes to the figure at her side, and the look in his eyes nearly broke my heart. He believed in me. He believed in me so strongly that he was here, risking his life. He had no idea what Iapos;d been through, no idea how long itapos;d been, for me, since I saw him last. I used to love him, I think.
I stood, and locked eyes with my enemies - my enemies who had been my friends, my rivals, my neighbors, my lovers. My eyes were burning the blue of justice, and it felt almost too right to open my mouth and bring my home down, crashing around my ears.
"Brilliant work" Exclaimed the skater girl, when it was all over. "How long did it take? They nearly glowed with trust for you."
I opened my mouth to tell her, to try to put those two-and-a-half decades into words, but the truth burned my throat, and I would have cried. "Fifteen months." I lied through my teeth. "They were a lot easier to crack than I thought. For you guys?"
"Two months." Iapos;d calibrated the machine well, then. It was not the most exact of devices.
"Capos;mon" The girl said, gesturing me to get in the machine, to fly away from this rubble and empty memories. "Letapos;s do the next one"
The man shook his head. "You go." He gestured her to the machine. "Weapos;ll be along in a bit; Iapos;ll use my wrist." He referred to the short-distance teleporter on his wristband. Iapos;d forgotten about it.
When the girl had gone, he looked at me. "Fifteen months." It was halfway between a question and an accusation.�
I started to cry, hollowly, and he drew me into a hug.
*************
There was another dream, that Iapos;ll post later.
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